More than a year after West Virginia officials began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, state birth certificates for adopted children still list “mother” and “father” next to the blanks for the parents’ names.

Unlike other states that are resisting changing the certificates, the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources has said birth certificates are being revised and will be ready to be distributed early next month, The Charleston Gazette-Mail reports (http://bit.ly/1Jbyiok).

Department spokesman Toby Wagoner said this week that the process started several months ago, but software updates had caused the changes to take some time.

American Civil Liberties Union of West Virginia attorney Jamie Lynn Crofts said inaccurate birth certificates can lead to greater scrutiny or even rejection of the birth certificates by organizations that require the birth certificate as proof of the parental relationship.

A Kansas lawmaker said he will seek an audit to determine whether the state Department for Children and Families discriminates against same-sex couples in foster care and adoption cases amid questions about why a Topeka councilman and his wife were granted custody of a child who had been cared for by a lesbian couple for 11 months.

The effort from Rep. Jim Ward, a Democrat from Wichita, comes after the Topeka couple, Jonathan and Allison Schumm, were charged in November with one count each of aggravated battery and four counts of endangering a child. The Department of Children and Families had recommended the couple receive custody of a child who had been in the custody of Lisa and Tesa Hines of Wichita.

Last Friday, a Utah judge reversed an order he had issued just three days earlier thatwould have removed a young girl from her home because her foster parents are lesbians. Under fierce pressure that even included grumbling by the state’s Republican governor, Judge Scott Johansen issued a temporary reversal after first ruling that it was “not in the best interest of children to be raised by same-sex couples.” The shift is good news for the girl and her foster parents, April Hoagland and Beckie Peirce; for child welfare advocates; and for anyone concerned with fairness, equality, or evidence-based policy.

Children living in a same-sex household may not be blessed as babies or baptized until they are 18, the Mormon Church declared in a new policy. Once they reach 18, children may disavow the practice of same-sex cohabitation or marriage and stop living within the household and request to join the church.

The policy changes, which also state that those in a same-sex marriage are to be considered apostates, set off confusion and turmoil among many Mormons after the policy was leaked online. The changes in the handbook for local church leaders for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints were confirmed Thursday by church spokesman Eric Hawkins.

When the Supreme Court invalidated same-sex marriage bans in June, the Justices acknowledged they had the kids in mind.

In the majority opinion, Justice Kennedy cited the infringement of the interests of children being raised by same-sex couples as one reason for the Court’s ruling.

Who are these kids? An estimated 220,000 children under the age of 18 are being raised in same-sex families in the United States. Half are nonwhite.

Protecting kids’ rights

My research, scholarship and advocacy efforts have focused on children, particularly black children, for the past 10 years. In an amicus brief filed in Obergefell — the Supreme Court case that ended same-sex marriage bans — my coauthors and I highlighted the legal and economic deprivations children in these families suffer when their parents can’t marry.

Same-sex couples in Ontario say they shouldn’t have to adopt their own children or get a legal declaration of parentage, and hope an NDP bill will modernize some outdated regulations.

New Democrat Cheri DiNovo will introduce a private member’s bill this week to make birth registration services available to all LGBTQ families.

“Let’s get rid of the red tape and give queer and trans parents the recognition they need to care for their children,” said DiNovo. “It’s not right that parents should have to adopt their own children, that’s the simple reality.”

Ontario’s Children’s Law Reform Act presumes a man and woman will be parents, which led to some troubling times for Kristi Mathers McHenry of Toronto when her wife developed serious heart problems while in labour.

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